IMS

The ITEXPO West 2010 Show Guide is here and if you are flying to the show - you may want to download it to your Kindle/laptop/iPad/netbook/smartphone or print it. I am on the plane now and we have the equivalent of a 300 baud modem's worth of bandwidth so I can't download it but as I recall it is over 100 pages and gives you a solid overview of the dozen conferences taking place next week.

In addition it shows you the exhibit hall with over 200 exhibitors and which sections correspond to which technology.

I have this dream that I will have enough time to go through the directory and point to some of the interesting highlights in a blog post.

We'll see how that works out.

Here is the PDF and it is fairly compressed down to 5 Megs as I recall - we may be getting a higher res one soon as well in case you have the bandwidth.

Infonetics says the VoIP/UC space will be up 13% this year over last. It is no secret that the current business environment is very tough and this growth in a single and relatively mature sector of the market reminds us there are many sectors of tech and communications which are even younger and subsequently hold promise for even greater growth rates.

4G, M2M, backhaul, optical, smart grid, cloud - these are only a few sectors of the market which are poised to continue growth - even in a very challenging macroeconomic environment.

The timing of the report is good as Tom Keating points out - since ITEXPO takes place next week and numerous industries will converge in Los Angeles to learn more about communications and technology - virtually every important sector will be represented via numerous vendors.

Hi all, my marketing team was good enough to provide me with this comprehensive overview of ITEXPO and all the related events and content at the show which takes place Oct 4-6, 2010 - yes, next week. I hope this snapshot is something you find useful.

From Grids to Clouds, ITEXPO Has It Covered.
So Much Value for Your Investment. Free Workshops, Great Networking, Amazing Keynotes, 12 Collocated Events.

I just happened upon the latest Internet Telephony newsletter and these articles are worth a read. The Maryland headset story is focused on another state mandating hands-free driving but what makes it interesting is that Maryland drivers have the second-longest US commute. In addition the Alcatel-Lucent ng Connect initiative seems to be gaining traction with 22 11 member companies looking to develop a common framework and standards which will allow more sophisticated 4G and LTE services.Finally, the Avaya and Skype story is good news for people such as myself who have been wondering why two communiocations companies with a common parent aren't collaborating more closely.

4GWE focuses on the evolution to a 4G infrastructure and the mobile broadband applications that it will enable. 4GWE represents the wireless ecosystem; from service providers seeking answers on delivering services and meeting demand, to device manufacturers and developers seeking to understand the killer 4G applications and the partners that will distribute these applications.

It is no secret that technology is moving the world from being relaxed to real-time and companies more than ever need to be able to turn on a dime to be competitive. But while industries have increased their speed, offline advertising has stayed fairly stodgy.

For example, online advertisers - many news sites in fact, launched targeted ad campaigns the moment they learned about the BP oil spill but television and radio advertisers have to wait a good deal of time for new ads to be created and distributed.

I was reading an interesting article on TMCnet from Bob Emmerson about how SMS can not only help entrepreneurs in third-world countries but it can also be used to update video ads (via MMS) in taxis and other places such as elevators, restaurants and grocery check-out lines.

As mobile advertising becomes a larger area and the addressable market becomes not only the devices mentioned above but every cell phone in existence, the opportunity for technology to help advertisers increase sales rates becomes very real. For example, let's say hundreds of thousands of people descend upon a sports arena - at the moment the MVP of the game is announced, advertisers can beam out targeted ads congratulating the player and offering a related discount.

Then there are ads which can be rolled out tied to news of the day.

In short, the targeted and intelligent use of technology can help increase advertising ROI while helping boost carrier revenue.

Federating and aggregation are key to carriers looking to compete in the new world was a message from the Metaswitch Forum this morning during the CTO Show presentation. Andy Randall, senior vice president of marketing and business development, sets the stage for CTO Chris Mairs who lays out a service provider blueprint for the next decade.

The audience was presented with a a colorful history of technology starting with the steam engine to the present and there was lots of talk about common day opportunities.

One recurring theme was Google as customer - carriers know the search engine is competitor but talk of working with them as a customer was frequent. Other discussions revolved around open APIs and and the company will participate in ecommerce and social networking companies through loose affiliations.

Transition to cloud will be a fundamental reconfiguration of our business and those adjacent to our own. Carriers will have to look to new ecosystems to replace current revenue streams.